DESCRIPTION AND STATUS
OF CAGAYAN PROVINCE,
THE DRESS AND CUSTOMS
OF ITS NATIVES, AND ITS
RIVERS AND CREEKS
CAGAYAN
Rehiyon 2 - Batanes; Cagayan;
Isabela; Nueva Vizcaya; Quirino
Kabisera – Tuguegarao City
Lengguwahe - Ilocano; Ibanag;
Ivatan; Itawis; Gaddang; Yogad;
Isinay; Ilongot; Tagalog; English;
others
Cagayan River (Río Grande de
Cagayán) – longest river in the
Philippines
Karayan – pinagmulan ng salitang
Cagayan; nangangahulugang ‘river’
Palay, mais, kape, karne, gulay -
Produktong pang-agrikultura ng
Cagayan
THE BOXER CODEX
• Manila Manuscript
• Circa 1590
• Consists of texts describing the
places, people or
• inhabitants, and customs
• 75 images of inhabitants of China,
Philippines,
• Java, Moluccas, Landrones, and
Thailand
• 88 images depicting birds and
fantastic animals, and a Spanish ship
• Owned by Governor General
• Luis Perez Dasmariñas
• (1593-1596)
• Acquired by Professor Charles R.
Boxer, a Iberian colonial maritime
scholar (1947)
• Lily Library at Indiana University
GEOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS
OF CAGAYAN
• Named by the Spaniards as City of
Segovia
• Presence of creeks and fertility of
land forms
• Importance of Tajo River (for food
subsistence and settlement)
• Richness of gold
• Seasons (summer and winter)
• “It is believed that they have many
mines in the mountains, but they do
not want to show them to the
Spaniards, fearing that the Spaniards
would appropriate these.”
CUSTOMS OF THE CAGAYANES
• Putting high value on some stones
(bulaganes and bahandines) worn by
women as jewelry
• Men’s clothing: bahaques and a skirt
of black cloth
• Wearing crowns or garlands
WARS AND WEAPONS
• Engagement of the natives in wars
which was evident in their weapon
• Weapons: lances, shields, daggers,
bow and arrow, corselets, helmets,
and spears
• Practice of head-hunting
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE
NATIVES
• Chiefs as brave indios, treacherous,
and cruel
• Engaged in drinking, fighting, and
killing
 • Jealous men (to the extent that they • Bringing the child (of a chief) to war
could kill their wives) to witness cutting off heads
• “They adore the devil, invoking and
painting it in the form in which it
BURIAL CUSTOMS
appears to them, usually calling this
figure anito.” • Burying the deceased together with
several material things
• Observing the proper clothing worn
BELIEFS AND PRACTICES
in the funeral
• Believing in superstitions (e.g. a bird
as a good or bad omen)
• Adoring the anito
• Celebrating feasts
• Practicing (cruel?) maganito for:
➢ divining something from the
anito
➢ healing the sick
➢ betrothal and marriage
➢ harvesting
• “In the twenty or thirty days during
the feast lasts, they do not stop
dancing and singing, until some get
tired and others take their place; while
chiefs and brave indios eat and drink
until they fall down drunk or pass
out…”

CUSTOMS ON MARRIAGE
• Giving dowry to the woman
• Setting rules on dowry
(returning/retaining the dowry if one
breaks the marriage)
• Allowing divorce

CHILD-REARING PRACTICES
• Following some norms upon the birth
of the child
• Teaching the son (at the age of 8) how
to use bow and arrow, lances, and
spears